Interactions between the developmental and adult social environments mediate group dynamics and offspring traits in Drosophila melanogaster.

Developmental conditions can strongly influence adult phenotypes and social interactions, which in turn affect key evolutionary processes such as sexual selection and sexual conflict. While the implications of social interactions in phenotypically mixed populations at the individual level are increasingly well known, how these effects influence the fate of groups remains poorly understood, which limits our understanding of the broader ecological implications. To address this problem we manipulated adult phenotypes and social composition in Drosophila melanogaster - by experimentally manipulating the larval density of the group-members - and measured a range of group-level outcomes across the lifespan of groups.